Red
by rallamajoop
Summary: Sometime after the events of the Side Red/Side Black drama CDs, Sol catches just enough of a hint of I-no's part in the Battle of Rome to draw all the wrong conclusions. Some implied Sol/Ky, though mostly due to I-no's dirty mind.


As soon as he caught sight of a flash of red vinyl passing between two buildings on the edge of a newly cleaned battlefield, Sol knew he was in for a bad day.

It had been a pretty unremarkable battle up until then, massive civilian casualties aside – but they'd arrived too late to be much help to the poor sods and Sol was far beyond losing sleep over it. Maybe he should've been glad their surprise spectator hadn't felt the need to get involved in any way that would make things interesting for them, (whatever side _that_ might have meant she'd be fighting on). But then, knowing I-no (which Sol didn't much, and didn't want to, even if she _had_ made a hell of a first impression), she was probably just there to watch with a glass of wine and a score card, or whatever the hell it was she did for light entertainment. He wasn't already in such a bad mood at the time that being reminded of her existence was enough to push him over the edge, but if he didn't explain to her how important it was that she get out of the Order's face this scene would probably end with their underaged Commander inviting the bitch in for tea or something, and that thought was far more than he could take.

She'd disappeared from sight behind the next building when Sol started moving, and he might've left it at that if he'd trusted her just to stay out of the way, but the odds he'd been wrong about who he thought he'd just seen were too low to chance it. She hadn't gotten far by the time he rounded the corner (apparently some part of some dead Gear had caught her attention, or maybe just caught on her shoe or whatever) but the moment she looked up long enough to spot him, recognition dawned right away and if he hadn't identified her right from the start, the sneer her face twisted itself into was unmistakable.

"You again?" he growled at her.

"Isn't that my line?" There was going to be no breath wasted on feigned innocence or flirting on Sol's account, I-no's voice dropped straight into a threatening growl. "Back for more?"

"The fuck are you doing here?" Sol snarled back. "Get lost."

"Oh?" said I-no. "It's your business where I go now? When did the Order start sticking its grubby fingers into other people's business?"

If Sol had had anything to do with commanding the Order, they would have had at least a whole fist in the business of anyone with half I-no's history of being found miraculously unscathed in towns recently decimated by Gear attack, but he wasn't going to waste any breath explaining that to her. The real Commander _should_ have been occupied with one of his administrative things involving the few survivors they'd pulled out of this wreck – Sol had been pretty much counting on that, or would have rationalised it that way if he'd bothered to give it any thought. However, he hadn't even had time to come up with an appropriate return threat before he was interrupted by the sound of footsteps running up behind him, and then he was hearing the familiar sound of a certain voice angrily calling his name, and belatedly realised that he should've just ignored I-no from the start because all he'd done now was to draw attention to her.

"Exactly where do you think you're going?" Ky snapped at him as he rounded the corner. I-no's face contorted in contempt, and for a moment, Sol didn't even know which of them he hated more.

"Much as I'd love to stop and play, now doesn't look like the best time, so ciao!" I-no called, taking advantage of Sol's distraction to blow them a kiss as she slipped off around another corner.

Ky looked from Sol to where I-no had been standing and back again, as if he had no idea what was going on. "Running off like that just for one ordinary civilian? From the way you were behaving, I thought at _least_…"

"Call that a civilian?" Sol grumbled back, picturing the whole I-no debate starting all over again.

Ky didn't even hesitate. "Surely even you can tell the difference between an ordinary woman and the enemy! It's behaviour like this that makes civilians distrust the Order in the first place. It…." And there Ky paused, and actually glanced behind himself to try and figure out what Sol was staring at. "What on earth is wrong with you?"

Sol didn't bother replying, just turned on the spot and took off after I-no like there was fire on his heels.

Because I-no had been standing not a dozen paces away, and even if her face hadn't been close up, the politest description her outfit deserved was 'memorable', and now Ky was acting like he didn't have the first clue what Sol was upset about – and suddenly something that had been only faintly bothering him about Ky's behaviour for most of the last year had leapt up and started ringing air-raid volume alarm bells in Sol's head.

Ky wasn't being dumb, he honestly hadn't recognised I-no at all. Oh _fuck_.

***

He nearly lost her twice inside the city – the bitch could really move, but Sol kept on her trail out of sheer fury until she gave up dodging him between buildings and took off into the wilderness beyond. Lucky for the city; by that time Sol would have been just about ready to level everything in sight and pick for her body in the rubble if she'd disappeared again.

The woodlands she led him through gave her limited cover, or would have if she hadn't been dressed in the colour of a traffic sign, but what speed she gained by flicking between the trees with the ease of a musical note, Sol made up by being quite prepared to mow down anything that got in his way.

He'd been too glad to see the back of her when she'd disappeared again after the battle of Rome to care where she'd gone, just as long as she stayed out of his way. Ky had come back from his mad stunt out on the battlefield so exhausted he could barely see straight. He'd never mentioned I-no again, which Sol had been too happy with to ever risk changing by bringing the subject up. She'd been gone, and as much as he'd regretted missing the chance to beat whatever she'd been hiding out of her, he hadn't given a damn what happened to her as long as she stayed out of his way. Reminding Ky about her had been the last thing on his mind.

None of which was any consolation now he'd had it thrust in his face just how stupid he'd been to miss that there had to be something else going on. This was _Ky Kiske_, a guy who sent personalised letters of consolation to the grieving families of any deceased soldier he'd had even a passing acquaintance with. The idea he'd just forget about someone like I-no was about as plausible as him standing idly by while someone set a church on fire.

But Sol could kick himself for this later. He had a lot of pain to visit on someone else first.

He burst out of the trees to find himself on a wide, rocky outcrop. For a moment he thought he'd lost her again, but the next he heard a voice saying, "Well? How will this do as a stage?"

I-no was perched on a giant boulder just off the path, legs crossed comfortably, guitar held as if he'd just caught her in the middle of tuning it.

Sol responded by blasting the whole boulder out from under her

From the look on I-no's face, she'd been ready for him to do just about anything – _except_ that. She squawked ridiculously as the blast hit, and if she'd had any less far to fall, probably wouldn't have had any chance at all to right herself before landing. By that time, Sol was close enough to send his weapon swinging at her head. I-no barely moved fast enough to duck it, and practically threw herself out of the way of his next blow with none of her usual poise. She must have had the sense to put some deliberation into it, however, because she landed by her fallen guitar, with enough space to grab it by the neck and swing at him, forcing him to halt his own offensive long enough to block. A high kick forced him to step back another pace, and gave her the opening to lift her guitar again and strum her fingers over the strings, producing a screeching, high-pitched note – enough to burst the eardrums of lesser mortals. It would have been a good trick against anyone else, but Sol wasn't listening to anything but the sound of his own blood pumping in his ears, wasn't feeling anything more subtle than the need to pound her into the ground, and he didn't even flinch.

By the time I-no had realised her attack hadn't had the desired effect, he was almost on top of her again, and she had to block a wild kick at something very nearly past the last possible moment, guitar raised at an awkward angle. But Sol wasn't thinking clearly enough to be fighting very smart and she wasn't completely unsuited for melee, and she almost had a guitar string tightening around his neck before he caught on to what she was doing. Sol wrapped his hand around the string and yanked hard enough to jerk the guitar out of her grip; I-no reacted in time to turn the motion to her advantage, grabbing the instrument by the neck again and twisting to bring it swinging back towards him with force, but Sol countered it, breaking every rule in the book about the futility of attacking your opponent's weapon, and guitar and blade connected with the sound of snapping strings and wood cracking under the blow.

"You bastard!" I-no shrieked at him, not a shred of her usual flirtatiousness remaining. "You'll pay for that…!"

Pausing long enough to talk was her next mistake – Sol hadn't stopped for a moment. Before she'd even finished the line, there was a wall of flame racing towards her. She leapt sideways out of the way, remembering almost too late that the stage she'd so carefully chosen ended abruptly where the ground dropped away into a steep cliff beneath the ledge, far too close behind her. She stumbled into a bad landing and had nowhere left to go between the fire and the fall when every ounce of Sol's weight landed on her from above and pinned her down.

"What the fuck did you do to him?!" he was yelling almost before they'd hit the ground.

"What's the matter – jealous?" she sneered, scarcely less sharp even though she was near gasping for breath. "Forcing yourself on a woman just to make such ill-mannered demands…"

"Cut the crap," Sol growled, "He didn't have any idea who you were. You tryin'a tell me that means _nothing!?_"

"His memory must be half-baked. Perhaps he's taken too many hits to the head? It was most rude of him to forget me, you'd think I'd made more of an impression."

When Sol slammed her back against the ground again, this time she didn't even flinch.

"Don't fuck with me. He knows half his army by name, and he forgets _you?_"

" 'I took his memory away,' is that what you want to hear?" I-no suggested, her voice low and dangerous. "Went in and wiped myself away?"

"Why you…"

"Isn't it just 'why' you want to ask me? Why I couldn't stand the thought of that precious little boy scout remembering my name?"

"What else did you take?" Sol growled, struggling with the urge to rip off her head right there and to hell with the details – her reasons hardly mattered when he was this certain she deserved it. "Spit it out or…"

I-no actually laughed at him, weakly, but still far too loud for comfort. "You're wondering, aren't you?" she wheezed, rolling her eyes up and flexing her fingers in a way only she could ever have made that suggestive. "What I did to your boytoy that was so terrible I couldn't let him remember?"

She was messing with him, he had no excuse for not knowing that, but for several terrible moments, Sol saw red.

I-no laughed again, even louder – a bold act considering he was already about a second away from crushing her windpipe as it was. "Oh you're _pathetic_. The truth?" leaning up as far as she could go, so that she was speaking into his left ear, she whispered, "I saved his life."

"…what?" Sol jerked back away from her, barely remembering to keep his weight on her solidly enough to keep her pinned.

"The battle of Rome. _You_ remember, don't you? That tired little boy took down a Megadeath-class all by his lonesome self? Don't make me laugh!"

Damn it, he _had_ wondered about that – why on earth had he ever let himself write it off so easily? "_You_ did?"

"Under_stand_ now?"

Sol didn't understand one fucking thing about this. "Why would you hide that?"

"What, let him remember?" This time the laugh overreached itself and turned into a sickly cough. "You think I'd suffer through the boy scout expressing his eternal gratitude for my help? The very thought makes me sick."

"Then why save him?" Sol ground out, shaking her again.

If he'd had thought he'd known what I-no sounded like when she was expressing scorn, he was about to be proven wrong. "Hah, you don't have _any_ idea, do you? What happens to the world if he's not there to lead his little army into victory? Would you rather do it all yourself?"

There was something in her voice – suggestive of he didn't know what and couldn't begin to guess (and she must have known he couldn't guess or she'd never have relished telling him this much) but he made himself focus on the part that mattered. "You telling me you'd save him for that? What would you care?"

"Don't you imagine I did it for their sake – those pathetic humans, so helpless they couldn't even defeat their own creation – but what else is there to entertain me? A world where the war is lost would be the most tedious place." I-no looked him straight in the eye, and for one psychotic, gut clenching moment even Sol had to feel like he might be the more human of the two of them. "Do you think I needed more reason, Mister Flame of Corruption?"

And the surprising part was, Sol couldn't find a single reason to think she was lying.

So that was it. Even a cold-blooded psychopath who watched slaughter for fun knew the world was screwed without Ky around to lead the human race to his damned salvation. Sol could have made her tell him what made her so sure, but he had no stomach for the answer. The hell was the point in arguing, anyway? You only had to see the wonder reflected in the faces of every soldier Ky passed to know the whole world believed the same, and when enough people believed something that hard it didn't even have to be justified to bring everything crumbling down with it if it fell. Sol was just the only one who hadn't let himself see it.

He got to his feet at last, an unusually hard trick when even looking at I-no was becoming more than he could stand. "Get lost," he muttered at her, barely more than a low growl from somewhere deep in his throat.

"What, tired of me already?" I-no sneered, taking her time to get back to her feet. "I wouldn't have thought _you'd_ discover mercy in…"

"Get out of my sight before I change my mind," said Sol, swiping his weapon at her for emphasis. He hadn't really meant for it to connect, but I-no was still unsteady and flinched further than she should have, put one foot wrong behind her and vanished over the edge of the cliff with no time for more than one last look of surprise. There was a series of thumps, and then silence.

There wasn't much hope the fall would have killed someone like her, but at least he could satisfy himself with the knowledge it had to have hurt like a bitch.

After a moment's thought, he kicked the guitar down after her too.

***

Getting back meant dealing with a Commander who was quietly livid at him for running off. "To think I'd assumed that chasing strange women was the one sin you didn't partake in."

"Miss me that much, huh?" Sol ground out, too tired to think of a better retort. Chasing an old acquaintance off into the wilderness had seemed like a much better idea before he'd gotten lost for an hour on the way back. He was tempted to ask whether Ky was really so stupid as to think _that_ was what it had all been about, but it wouldn't be worth it. Let the kid believe what he liked, anything would be better than letting him know he owed that bitch his life.

It all made him feel so fucking old.

It had been fortunate for I-no she hadn't mentioned her new employer that day, or a little fall down a shear cliff face would have been the nicest thing she could have expected from him. Sol didn't find that one out until much later, when his Order days were well behind him. It didn't surprise him as much as it probably should have, not with her past record of finding ways to piss him off.

In fact, the day Sol did finally turn his back on the Holy Order for good, stolen Fuuenken burning in his fingers, was only a few months after that. By then he had enough excuses that he didn't have to waste much mental effort telling himself that leaving had nothing to do with what he'd learned that day – nothing to do with whether a teenaged brat with a head full of crazy ideals could do more to end this war in his short lifetime than Sol had done in a hundred years. Good thing too – if he'd had to think on it any harder, even he might not have been able to make himself believe it.


End file.
